


a candle at my chest and a hand on his knee

by zombeesknees



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-09-16 19:33:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16960197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombeesknees/pseuds/zombeesknees
Summary: The Doctor struggles with night terrors and a soldier's trauma. | Written many moons ago on LJ.





	a candle at my chest and a hand on his knee

_“Run!”_

The first word he’d ever said to her, the first time her hand had ever felt his — and how she had taken that simple command to heart. 

Sometimes it felt like that word was stamped across her heart, right next to his name. To Rose, running was just part of the package—it was in the Doctor’s blood, and she wouldn’t stop until he did. She never questioned the running, never wondered why it was so important to never stop—she just accepted that it _was_ and held on tighter.

It wasn’t until the night they couldn’t run any more that she learned _why_ the Doctor never stopped.

\---

She’d broken a heel in the sprint across the grating. He’d put a rip in his leather jacket. They were gasping for breath, panting for it, as he flipped the switches and pressed the buttons that sent the TARDIS spinning away through time and space.

“I think I’m gonna fall over,” Rose managed to say, leaning shakily against the TARDIS console, too exhausted to even brush away the strands of hair that clung to the sweat on the back of her neck. 

“Haven’t run like that since Attila nearly trampled me on that pony of his,” the Doctor agreed, slowly pulling off his jacket to inspect the rip. “Damn. This’ll need a patch. How are you with a needle and thread?”

“Forget sewing,” Rose sighed heavily. “I think I’m just gonna lay here until I can make my legs move again.” She sank down to the cold metal floor.

“Yeah,” the Doctor said, an edge of weariness to his voice that she’d never heard before. He bent down, tugged up one of the sections of grating, and pulled a blanket out from the recesses below.

“This place is like Aladdin’s lamp,” Rose mumbled as he draped the blanket around her. “It’s got everything you could ever want.”

“Yeah,” he agreed quietly, flashing a quick smile. “Just about.”

\---

Her body jumped, as if startled by the sharp retort of a gun. It was a long moment before her heartbeat had smoothed evenly, before the bitter tang of adrenaline began to fade from her tongue, and she could see and think clearly.

She’d moved. She remembered the comfortable hum and vibration of the TARDIS engines against her back—now she was lying in her bed. The Doctor must have moved her. She must have been really out of it, to sleep through being picked up and carried, to not even remember the feel of his arms around her—

Wait. Why had she woken up? Had it just been one of those strange night terrors, a brief flash of fear across her subconscious that had manifested in a physical reaction? 

Where had the Doctor gone?

Her legs still felt incredibly weak and sore; she faintly recalled learning something about exercise producing lactic acid in a phys ed class years ago. With the blanket draped over her shoulders and one hand pressed against the wall, she slowly made her way down the hall to his bedroom.

The door was wide open. Hardly unusual for him; he never closed doors—she supposed he’d just gotten used to having the entire place to himself. No need to close doors for privacy when it was just you and the singing, humming engines of the TARDIS. 

Every light in the room was on, though, and she wondered how he could sleep at all, exhausted or not. Her eyes were watering, it was so bright. What, did he collect lamps? And just how did the TARDIS feel, expending this much energy? 

She stepped over the threshold. Found the first switch, then the next, then the next. It took several minutes, but finally the only illumination was the dim, flickering bedside lamp. 

Rose hesitated, her fingers on the chain. He lay on his side, turned away from her. The outline of his ear in the murky illumination was somehow fascinating—no doubt she’d reached that stage of fatigue where the smallest thing could be mesmerizing—and she sat down on the edge of the bed to study him.

She had glanced into his room before. But never when he was in it. She had wondered if he ever really used it as anything more than a place to store clothes. His bed had never been rumpled; the pillows had never held the impression of his head. In fact, the longer she thought the more it struck her that she’d never seen the Doctor sleep. He was always bustling around the console or making tea in the kitchen when she went to her room for the night—and he would still be there (a fresh jumper the only evidence that he’d ever left) when she shuffled out the next morning, eyes full of sleep and hair a wild bird's nest. 

But it appeared Time Lords did sleep. The king-sized bed wasn’t simply for show. 

She debated for a short moment on untying his scuffed boots (surely it wasn’t comfortable to sleep with them on?), but was afraid the movement would wake him. And if _she_ had needed sleep, he needed it to a greater extent. He’d been the one climbing up the half-finished building’s frame, swinging across the gap on a rope made of insulated cables, struggling with the suicidal assistant for control of the remote—

“It’s the only way.”

Her heart jumped up into her throat. 

But no, he wasn’t awake—only talking in his sleep. It had been so startling because he sounded completely lucid. 

“It has to end.” His voice was sharp, brittle, as if the words took a great physical effort to speak. “And it ends today. Last chance—your very last chance. You know I don’t want to do this. Don’t make me do this. Stand down. Please, just stand down. _Don’t make me do this._ ”

There was a pause, and Rose had the eerie feeling that he was listening to the other side of the conversation. 

“Then you give me no choice. It’s either you, or the universe. Millions of species at the cost of two. A steep price, but it looks like it’s mine to pay. I can’t pay it readily—but at least I can do it quickly.”

There was a heartbeat of silence.

And then he screamed. It was terrifying and horrible, full of pain and sorrow, as if some invisible force was ripping him apart. It was the sound of a heart breaking, of something miraculous and beautiful and unique dying in agony.

“Doctor!” Her own scream was pale in comparison, a mere human cry of fear and pity, but somehow it cut through whatever terror had gripped him. The scream stopped as Rose’s hand tightened around his shoulder, shaking him with a frantic strength born of desperation.

A shudder ran through his body, his breath hitching in his raw throat. He pushed himself up from the pillow, face turned away from her and obscured by shadow.

“I frightened you,” he said in a hollow voice. 

She clumsily took his hand; hers was shaking. “You were having a nightmare.”

“No, I wasn’t,” he said dully. “I was remembering.”

“…About the War?”

He only nodded, the barest tilt of his head. Then he turned, and the raw, naked expression on his face made her tighten her grip on his hand even as tears began to burn the corners of her eyes. 

“Sometimes it feels impossible. That it all happened. That I did those things. That I can even look back at it without going mad.” He looked at her, really looked at her, as if searching for something in her. 

Rose met those overwhelming, blue eyes as steadily as she could. And in that moment, that tiny slice of time, she was fully aware of how small she was compared to this inscrutable man. The things he had seen, the lives he had touched, the terrible and wonderful things he had done. For the first time she saw how vast his life was, how overwhelming it must become. Seeing everything in history as vibrant and present and _alive_ as her hand on his in this single moment; seeing every potential in the future before the choices had even been made. He knew the name of every star, every planet, every alien race living among those planets and stars—and he was sitting here brushing the back of her hand with his thumb. 

How unbearably lonely it must be. To know all of that, to have the burden of that knowledge and those memories so heavy on your shoulders. And to have traveled for so long without someone to share it with.

She did the only thing she could when the moment of breathless epiphany had passed and the bedside clock began ticking anew. She threw her arms around him, hugging him tightly, fiercely, as she blinked away the hot tears.

“I’ve got you, Doctor,” she whispered, finding a smile.

“Oh, Rose Tyler,” he murmured against her shoulder, his hands warm against her back. “I knew you were fantastic. I knew it.”

How he admired and loved humanity. How they constantly surprised him. But perhaps never more than the night he discovered that a shopgirl from London could _understand_ what it was to be the last of the Time Lords; that she could understand and was ready to run with him over the next horizon, ready to put another adventure between them and the most difficult day of his life. 

He only picked the best—he’d boast about that soon. 

And, he suspected, he’d picked the _very_ best this time.


End file.
